Introduction

India is the second largest nation in the world, with a
population of 1.21 billion, accounting for nearly 18% of world’s human
population, but it does not have enough resources or adequate systems in place
to treat its solid wastes. Its urban population grew at a rate of 31.8% during
the last decade to 377 million, which is greater than the entire population of
US, the third largest country in the world according to population (3). India is facing a
sharp contrast between its increasing urban population and available services
and resources. Solid waste management (SWM) is one such service where India has
an enormous gap to fill. Proper municipal solid waste (MSW) disposal systems to
address the burgeoning amount of wastes are absent. The current SWM services are
inefficient, incur heavy expenditure and are so low as to be a potential threat
to the public health and environmental quality (4).
Improper solid waste management deteriorates public health, causes
environmental pollution, accelerates natural resources degradation, causes
climate change and greatly impacts the quality of life of citizens (See Section
4).

Figure 3, Impact of Improper SWM
on Pristine Ecosystems, Landfill Fires in Visakhapatnam Landfill, which is Located
in a Valley

Public Health and Quality of Life

The present citizens of India are living during times of
unprecedented economic growth, rising aspirations, and rapidly changing
lifestyles, which will raise the expectations on public health and quality of
life. Remediation and recovery of misused resources will also be expected. These
expectations when not met might result in a low quality of life for the citizens
(See Section 4.6). Pollution of whether air, water or land results in
long-term reduction of productivity leading to a deterioration of economic
condition of a country. Therefore, controlling pollution to reduce risk of poor
health, to protect the natural environment and to contribute to our quality of
life is a key component of sustainable development (5).

Waste Generation Rate & Quantity

The per capita waste generation rate in India has increased
from 0.44 kg/day in 2001 to 0.5 kg/day in 2011, fuelled by changing lifestyles
and increased purchasing power of urban Indians. Urban population growth and
increase in per capita waste generation have resulted in a 50% increase in the
waste generated by Indian cities within only a decade since 2001. There are 53
cities in India with a million plus population, which together generate 86,000
TPD (31.5 million tons per year) of MSW at a per capita waste generation rate
of 500 grams/day. The total MSW generated in urban India is estimated to be
68.8 million tons per year (TPY) or 188,500 tons per day (TPD) of MSW. Such a
steep increase in waste generation within a decade has severed the stress on
all available natural, infrastructural and budgetary resources.

Improper Waste Management

Big cities collect about 70 - 90% of MSW generated, whereas
smaller cities and towns collect less than 50% of waste generated. More than
91% of the MSW collected formally is landfilled on open lands and dumps (6). It is estimated
that about 2% of the uncollected wastes are burnt openly on the streets. About
10% of the collected MSW is openly burnt or is caught in landfill fires (5). Such open burning
of MSW and landfill fires together releases 22,000 tons of pollutants into the
lower atmosphere of Mumbai city every year (Figure 15).
The pollutants include carbon monoxide (CO), carcinogenic hydro carbons (HC)
(includes dioxins and furans), particulate matter (PM), nitrogen oxides (NOx)
and sulfur dioxide (SO2) (5).

Figure 4, Impact of Improper SWM
on Public health: Direct Exposure of Children to Emissions from Open Burning,
Hyderabad

Informal Recycling Sector

Most of the recyclable waste is collected by the informal
recycling sector in India prior to and after formal collection by Urban Local
Bodies (ULB). Amount of recyclables collected by informal sector prior to
formal collection are generally not accounted. This report estimates that 21%
of recyclables collected formally are separated by the formal sector at
transfer stations and dumps. Even though this number does not include amount of
recycling prior to formal collection, it compares fairly well with the best
recycling percentages achieved around the world (See Section 5.1.1). Informal recycling system is lately receiving its
due recognition world-wide for its role in waste management in developing
nations. In India, government policy and non-governmental organizations (NGOs)
are expected to organize the sector present in different regions, and to help integrating
it into the overall formal system. ‘Plastic Waste Management and Handling
Rules, 2011’ by the Ministry of Environment and Forests (MOEF) is a step ahead
in this direction. These rules mandate ULBs to coordinate with all stake
holders in solid waste management, which includes waste pickers.

Material and Energy Recovery from Solid Waste in India

All attempts to recover materials and energy from MSW have
encountered initial failures. Ten aerobic composting (MBT) projects in 1970s, a
WTE project in 1980s, a large scale biomethanation project, and two RDF
projects in 2003 have failed. Anaerobic digestion of MSW on a large scale does
not work in India due to the absence of source separated organic waste stream.
The large scale biomethanation plant built in Lucknow to generate 6 MW of
electricity, failed to run because of this. Anaerobic digestion has however
been successful at smaller scales, for vegetable and meat markets, restaurants
or hotels and at the household level. Twenty thousand household biogas units
installed by Biotech, a bio gas technology company from Thiruvananthapuram,
Kerala divert about 2.5% of organic waste from landfill. By doing so, they save
up to USD 4.5 million (INR 225 million) to Thiruvananthapuram, and Kochi ULBs
every year in transportation costs. These biogas units also avoid around 7,000
tons of CO2 equivalent (TCO2) emissions every year (See
Section 5.3).

Aerobic Composting (Mechanical Biological Treatment)

Aerobic composting is the most widely employed SWM
technology in India. It is estimated that up to 6% of MSW collected is
composted in various MBT facilities (7). There are more than
80 MBT plants in India treating mixed MSW, most of them located in the states
of Maharashtra (19), Himachal Pradesh (11), Chhattisgarh (9) and Orissa (7) (Appendix 8).
More than 26 new MBT plants are proposed in different cities and towns across
India (Appendix
8).
Even though composting of mixed wastes is a better solution compared to
landfilling or openly burning those wastes, it is not the best (8). Compost from MBT
facilities was found to be of low quality and to contain toxic heavy metals
which could enter human food chain if used for agriculture (See Section 5.2.3).

Refuse Derived Fuel (RDF) & Waste-to-Energy (WTE)

India has a total of five RDF processing plants, located
near Hyderabad, Vijayawada, Jaipur, Chandigarh and Rajkot. The first two plants
burn the RDF produced in WTE boilers, whereas the next two burn the RDF in
cement kilns. Details about the Rajkot facility are not available. All these
facilities have encountered severe problems during operation. Problems were majorly
due to lack of proper financial and logistical planning and not due to the
technology.

Only two WTE combustion plants were built in India, both in
New Delhi. The latest one among them has finished construction in Okhla
landfill site and is about to begin operations. It is designed to generate 16
MW of electricity by combusting 1350 TPD of MSW.

Initial Project Failures

All technological solutions attempted in India have
encountered initial failures in India. These include the ten MBT (composting)
facilities built in 1975-1976, the WTE facility built in 1985 in Delhi, the two
RDF plants built in 2003 near Hyderabad and Vijayawada. None of these plants
are currently in operation. The ten MBT and the 1985 WTE plant are now
completely closed. Major reasons for these failures are, the plants were
designed for handling more waste than could be acquired; allocation of funds
for plant maintenance was ignored; and local conditions were not considered
while importing the technology. The success of MBT in India is partly due to
the lessons learned from such failures. The failure of WTE however raised
enormous public opposition and has hindered any efforts in that direction.
Failure of biomethanation plants was also attributed to WTE combustion due to
the confusion in the terminology. Failure of RDF plants has attracted attention
and opposition too; however, numerous attempts at installing this technology
are continuously made.

MSW Rules 2000, Government of India

MSW rules 2000 made by the Government of India to regulate
the management and handling of municipal solid wastes (MSW) provide a framework
for treatment and disposal of MSW. These rules were the result of a ‘Public
Interest Litigation (PIL)’ in the Supreme Court of India (SC). The MSW rules
2002 and other documents published by the Government of India (GOI) recommend
adoption of different technologies, which include biomethanation, gasification,
pyrolysis, plasma gasification, refuse derived fuel (RDF), waste-to-energy combustion
(WTE), sanitary landfills (SLF). However, the suitability of technologies to
Indian conditions has not been sufficiently studied, especially with regard to
the sustainable management of the entire MSW stream and reducing its
environmental and health impacts.

Lack of Data

Due to lack of data and infrastructural, financial and human
resources, the Supreme Court mandate of complete compliance to the rules by
2003 could not be achieved by urban local bodies (ULBs) and that goal still
remains to be a distant dream (7). As a result, even after a decade since the issuance of
the MSW Rules 2000, the state of MSW management systems in the country
continues to raise serious public health concerns (9).
Although some cities have achieved some progress in SWM, many cities and
towns have not even initiated measures (7).
Initiatives in Mumbai were the result of heavy rains and consequent flooding in
2006 due to drains clogged by solid waste. The flood in Mumbai in 2006 paved
the way for enacting State level legislation pertaining to the collection,
transport and disposal of urban solid waste in the state of Maharashtra (7).Bubonic plague epidemic in Surat in 1994
increased awareness on the need for proper SWM systems all over India and kick
started measures to properly manage wastes in Surat.

Lack of Resources & JnNURM

Scarcity of suitable landfill
sites is a major constraint, increasingly being faced by ULBs. Such
difficulties are paving the way to building regional landfills and WTE and
mechanical biological treatment (MBT) solutions. The tremendous pressure
on the budgetary resources of States/ULBs due to increasing quantities of MSW
and lack of infrastructure has helped them involve private sector in urban
development (7).
GOI has also invested significantly in SWM projects under the 12th Finance
Commission and Jawaharlal Nehru National Urban Renewal Mission (JnNURM). The
financial assistance provided by GOI to states and ULBs amounted to USD 510
million (INR 2,500 crores) (7).

21 comments:

Congratulations and thank you for your great work. It is very useful to aspiring entrepreneurs in this space.

Just one comment - anaerobic digestion of municipal waste (non source separated) is, in fact, possible. Two-stage batch high solids digesters are capable of handling very high contamination rates (no pumping is required). Of course, the methane yield is lower for dirtier waste, but it is still workable for large volumes of the kind you see in typical cities.

Also - would love to chat about composting. It is unfortunate that contaminants are not removed from compost that is currently produced and shocking that the products still fetch such high prices. Can you resolve this mystery?

Could you please provide more information about the above large scale Anaerobic Digestion technology you mentioned? If possible, any reports or examples of operating plants anywhere, that will be really helpful to me and my colleagues. Many in this field are on the look out for such a technology.

Regarding high prices for compost: There was a time when naturally biodegraded waste at landfills was voluntarily collected by small and large farmers near a city for a nominal price. Then the amount of wastes grew and so did the necessity to accelerate composting, which introduced large scale mechanical composting at some landfills. The compost from these plants got a higher price because they had lesser/no glass or plastic in it, which reduced the effort that was needed to put in by farmers. Some farmers bought this new compost but some others still continued with the old one. There was a clear difference btw good and bad compost and the market moved towards this "good" compost. So bad compost meant presence of glass, plastic or metal.

In the current situation, bad compost means presence of heavy metals. Such compost (from mixed wastes) also has a lower nutritional value. There is no visible difference between good and bad compost. Even if there was, it still does not effect the prices because1) farmers/citizens are not aware of the possibility of heavy metals in compost (its considered natural and therefore good)2) there is no proper grading system in place for compost, which says, sample A or company A has good quality compost and company B has bad quality compost.

If you have any other questions, please provide your email and I will reply to you directly.

If you are looking for a WTE technology specifically, biogas is sustainable and cost effective at a small scale if you use the biogas for cooking. However, if you want to know about larger capacities, waste-to-energy combustion is the most risk-free technology.In case if you are looking for solutions to waste management and not just a WTE technology, then the best solution or the most cost effective solution will depend upon the city/region's local conditions and markets for resultant byproducts of the processes.

There is a huge gap in providing the service of waste management, be it collection, transportation or treatment and disposal. So, there are opportunities. However, the risk in business in waste management depends upon what services you would want to provide and on what scale you want to operate at.

I very concern about waste management & want to something for that. I do not have any experience and knowledge about waste mangement. Please tell what shoul I do at initial stage to go ahead. Is there any trainig or study programe going on in Inida ? Is there govt scheme for individua enterprisure ?

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